Models in That 'Sexy' Viral Ad Were 'Traumatized' After Big Reveal

As former CollegeHumor.com staffers, Josh Ruben and Vincent Peone had it drilled into their brains: Sex sells. Funny sells. Now, directing ads for brands like Budweiser, Trojan, and MTV, "Josh + Vince"—as they go by professionally—are the godfathers of the irreverent, viral video, and their latest one might be the best yet. I won't ruin the surprise for you, so just watch it, and you'll see why:

Most Popular

Humor?! That's the last creative direction we'd expect Save the Children, a non-profit organization aiding children in developing countries, to give directors for a PSA. Shouldn't they go with something heavy? Well, maybe—that's the traditional route—but it might not be the most impactful. Unfortunately, there are too many similar "Can you spare 5 cents a day for a dying child?" ads out there that people have grown callous—or, in my case, developed channel-changing reflexes that spring into action every time a few chords of Sarah McLachlan's "Angel" float through my TV speakers. (I just don't want to see that again.)

The people at Save the Children are smart and get that. "We knew that we wanted to start pushing boundaries," Suzanna Klaucke, Save the Children's manager of video production told ELLE.com of the ad's dark humor and surprise twist. "We literally said the words, 'How do we get people to care about this? It's not a sexy issue.'" (The issue being that in developing countries, mothers and young children die each day from mostly preventable causes simply because they don't have access to the medical treatment or basic resources they need.) "Then it clicked and we thought, 'Why don't we attempt to use humor and something sexy to draw attention to this serious issue, while being careful not to make light of the issue itself?"

Confused-looking beefcake model. Never not funny?

With that, they turned to Josh + Vince. "We knew that spreading awareness of these important issues was contingent on our every move, so the stakes definitely felt higher," Peone told ELLE.com. That meant keeping the models in the dark about the ad's real intention. "Audiences are smart, they're able to spot a phony immediately." Of course, there were a few stumbles pulling it all off:

"We cast a guy, Aubyn Gwinn, to play the director [instead of ourselves]," Ruben said. Meanwhile, he and Vince were just going to hang out on set, acting like they were part of the client's team. "But I had a major brain fart first thing in the morning, literally after our powwow about Aubyn taking on the role of director, where I went back to the holding room and shook a model's hand and said 'I'm Josh, one of the directors' followed by instantly biting my tongue."

"You want me to say whaaaat?"

"A few of our unsuspecting models admitted later they thought the ambiguous circumstances were slightly unusual, but in the end it didn't prevent us from getting the great reactions we needed," Peone said.

"Some people were traumatized by what was being asked of them, some laughed uncomfortably, but all reactions were in some way relatable. We were surprised to find the similarities here with the type of comedic work we're more accustomed to. Good comedy, at its core, is about finding truth. This was about going a bit further to find a deeper truth," Peone said. To that, we'd add that good advertising is about getting your client's message to resonate with viewers long after they've seen it. On that front and so many others, this PSA nails it—all in the name of a great cause, too.